Do any of you homeschool or are thinking of homeschooling?

[Eloise73]

Hi

I'm originally from Canada and homeschooling is not considered that strange there or in the U.S., i'm guessing here it isn't as widely accepted. DH and I have talked about whether homeschooling might be better for our daughter - not only because she has some difficulties but generally because our faith in the school system here is shaky at best.

Financially I have no idea how we'd manage as we both work (me PT). I'd have to give up my job which would make things tough but possibly doable. I feel capable to teach my daughter at home, in fact i'm sure DH and I would be pretty awesome at it (she says optimistically!).

Have any of you chosen this for your kids? And have any of you taken your kids out of school to homeschool? We really want the best for our daughter and from what I keep reading about the frustrations and brick walls some of you come against i'm wondering if its worth the aggravation and worry of putting her through the school system.

I dont home educate but i would be prepared to if the school system lets us down, Dd2 is due to start school in september, she has been refused a place at a SN school so will be going to MS, i have a feeling that things wont work out well for dd2 at MS so we are looking at home educating if it doesn't.

Very tempted to Eloise. The school system here is actually quite good, just not too great for children with SN, but I'm not sure it is particularly worse than anywhere else in the world.

I'm going to try the school system and pull ds out if it doesn't work out.

Yes i home educate my son we tried mainstream school when he was 4 and took him out after 2 weeks he then attended a school in hospital where he was going to be statemented but then we decided against it so hes back at home now.

Yes, we tried to work with two schools over five years but there was very little support for him (he has Asperger's) and what he did get was inadequate and at times counter-productive. We finally realised that despite all the statutory guidelines and promises there was nobody in our LEA prepared to accept responsibility for providing support and eventually he was actually being harmed by being in school.

We took him out over a year and a half ago at the beginning of Y5 and have never looked back. I dread to think what state he'd have been in by now if we hadn't.

We home educate. There are a lot of HEers in our area whose children have SEN of one sort or another.

Get yourself on this list: here it is very supportive and there are some seriously well informed people there!

I'm considering it, if our tribunal doesn't go in our favour (or if it does, if the residential school doesn't work out). However, I'm loathe to let the LA escape their responsibility for paying for DS' educational/therapy needs - and also prevent me from working and the impact it would have on our income.

I think HE can be really positive, but I'm that it's often a last resort for parents who are prevented from accessing appropriate education for SN children.

I home educate

I have a NT 9 year old who has never been to school (well she did 5 weeks last year out of curiosity) & my 3.5yo ds who has an ASD diagnosis will also be HE-ed (& our dd2). We currently run an ABA programme (part time about 18 hours a week) & ds has 6 hours at nursery - we'll finish both around he time he's 5 I expect.

We've just got back from a long weekend camping with HEing friends, of the 11 families there - over 70 people & that was just an informal get together - 5 have children with various ASD/related conditions. It's an incredibly positive, knowledgeable & supportive community - for me it has always been our first choice.

I did think of it briefly when things were very grim for dd (painful chronic joint disorder and unsympathetic head) but dd was totally unimpressed. She pointed out that since I can't drive and she can't do lots of travelling because of joints she really needs to be able to go to one place where she can be guaranteed to meet friends: travelling up and down country to HE meetings just isn't something she could do, and rather than be at home isolated she would rather haul herself in even if in horrendous pain. I saw her point. And devoted my energy towards reforming her school instead.

I am home educating my HFA 12 year old son. I took him out 2 1/2 years ago. My HFA 14 year old son is in mainstream, but his school has made a lot of changes for him, plus he likes it most of the time.

Do you feel you have to make a decision soon? Have you got involved in your local county's home education network yet?

we plan to HE DD1 when she finishes jr school. The secondary schools here are terrible and also due to our beliefs there are certain things i wouldnt want her learning iyswim

I was talking to a trainee teacher last week she was saying that they were told that home educating parents can claim the sum that schools would receive for educating children.

Not widely promoted and she couldn't remember the policy the funding was contained within, but it may be worthwhile looking into if you do/are thinking of HEd

I think that trainee teacher is totally confused (at least for England). However HE is pretty mainstream in the UK, doesn't get the resources from the state it does (at least) in some places in the US.
It has always been there as an option for my DS. Not used yet, and I managed to get all my DC into fab schools, but its still there if his square peg won't fit anymore.

The trainee teacher is totally wrong.

there's no state money available for people who electively home educate, just like there isn't for people who send their children to private schools.

if an LA CAN'T provide suitable schooling for a child, they have to cough up for tutors or whatever, but I'm guessing that an LA would admit very very very very rarely that they were unable to provide an education in a school setting. £££££, innit?